Chained, yet Confident
by Awareness Bringer
Summary: One-shot. Luffy reunites with a certain World Noble years after escaping from Marie Jois.


**Disclaimer: I don't own One Piece, Eiichiro Oda does.**

**[C]**

**Chained, yet Confident**

**[C]**

Immediately after learning what happened to Sabo, Luffy had broken away from Dadan and her group while they were keeping Ace away from getting payback on the World Noble so he could do just that. Unfortunately, his rushing in led to him being taken by Saint Jalmack's guards and soon enough branded as a slave. Forced into cruel labor on the best of days at the World Government's Holy Land of Marie Jois for almost a year, Luffy was, however, able to unlock his Haki abilities which broke him free from his explosive collar and was able to do the same with the other slaves stuck at Marie Jois as they all made their escape. Before Luffy left, though, he got involved with something that would affect his future voyage to Raftel years later.

During the chaos of the mass slave escape, Luffy saw a little girl younger than himself nearly get crushed by falling debris from a building a previous Giant slave had broken apart by accident in his own escape. Although Luffy instantly recognized the girl as a child Celestial Dragon, his action was instantaneous. He used his Gum-Gum Fruit power to stretch his arm straight towards the girl and saved her from getting killed. Quickly telling her to get to safety, the scared girl asked Luffy before he escaped. "Why did you help me?"

"Because you're just a kid, dummy!" He snapped in an impatient desire to get out of Marie Jois. "You probably aren't as bad as the rest of these people, so make good on that, or I'm coming back to finish you all off!"

Luffy then ran as fast as he could to the Red Port, and upon escaping, got in touch with his grandfather, Vice Admiral Garp, who brought him back home in the East Blue.

**[C]**

At the age of seventeen, Luffy had gotten to the Sabaody Archipelago on his way to becoming King of the Pirates when his Mermaid friend, Camie, was being put to sale for slavery. Although, he had acquired enough Berries to buy her freedom and was well-connected in the Government after replacing Crocodile as a Warlord of the Sea, even he couldn't outbid Saint Charloss' half a billion Berries. Immensely angry, Luffy figured that he would be able to get better results if he took Charloss and his family hostage, Warlord status be damned, when he caught the eye of Charloss' younger sister, Shalria, who smiled genuinely at him for an instant before then doing something that shook the whole Auction House by a storm. She bonked both her father and brother into unconsciousness and spoke out loud to the Auction House's manager, Disco.

"This may come as a surprise to you, Mr. Disco, but I had a recent discussion with your shop's owner, Warlord Doflamingo, and he admitted that he had no real interest in the slave trade anymore. After a reasonable payment, he then signed over this place to me. And as your new boss, I command you to set all these people you intend to sell free before I shoot you to death myself."

As soon as he processed the new information, Disco quickly did as he was told and removed his former merchandise from out of their bindings. As soon as Camie happily reunited with the Straw Hat Pirates, Shalria walked over to their group and spoke to Luffy with a bow that surprised him and his friends even further. "I apologize for the inconvenience, Warlord Luffy. I can assure you that this despicable excuse for an enterprise won't last in the Archipelago for long, though."

Having spent most of his life imagining ways of how he'd bring down the Government as Roger's future successor, Luffy didn't know how to respond before saying with his own bow. "It's all right, ma'am. Thanks for the help."

Shalria shook her head in dismissal. "No, Captain. It should be me thanking you for saving me in more ways than one almost ten years ago."

As Luffy processed that statement with a gasp, remembering of the moment in question, Shalria brought the building down once again by giving Luffy a quick, yet gentle, kiss before making her leave.

**[C]**

**Had been wanting to do a slave background Luffy one-shot for a while, especially one with a straight pairing rather than the usual M/M stuff, but I didn't know how to word it in a post-Arlong Park heart to heart between him and Nami at the time until I had this idea from Horror Behind The Cage of an interaction between him and Shalria. However, this had less to do with him being abused as "property" and more to do with how his kindness to even a young enemy could rub off on a young World Noble. Otohime was able to get through to Myosgard, somehow, so it's not exactly impossible, after all. I hope I made it workable enough, though, as I did with my earlier pairing one-shot between them called Earthborn Dragons. **

**I also don't know if much people are in the know as others are, but the Vivre Card Databook that has been updated by month since last September released details in March of this year that Shalria, in spite of her shapely figure fitting characters like Team Rocket's Jessie in Pokémon, is actually the same age as Chopper. Fifteen in Part 1 and seventeen in Part 2. Granted, Oda might be off his game, considering I wasted much writing attempts in April being bummed from not getting a real name of both Baby 5 and Buffalo compared to giving characters like Miss Goldenweek names like Marianne and such, but he must be clear about some more than others. I just hope that he actually does recognize that he may have made an error with not giving the two characters I mentioned real identities beyond their aliases and maybe add even more background to characters like Monet, Sugar, and Shalria as well as her family themselves. I really want to write a lemon featuring Luffy and Baby 5, but the latter's lack of a real name at the moment just keeps me from doing it because I think that if I do write such a scenario, it would make sense for Luffy to ask her what's her real name so he could call her that for relationship reasons.**


End file.
